Time to Consider Nullification as America’s Crisis Widens

The last few months of policymaking inside the Beltway have handed America the most bizarre set of crises in decades. First, President Obama nearly sparked Armageddon with Russia when he threatened striking Syria over alleged chemical weapons use.

Then, just as the world breathed a sigh of relief thanks to a microphone gaffe that became a peace agreement, the President and his allies in the Senate put Election 2014 above people’s lives by luring the House Republicans into a budget standoff that shutdown the federal government.

The first three weeks of October were like the movie V for Vendetta with Democrats reveling (and campaign fundraising) in the shutdown, pontificating over why the American people so desperately needed the federal government. No sooner did moderate Republicans hit the chicken switch and cave to raising the debt ceiling, Obama couldn’t wait to start a new crisis by bringing up immigration policy.

Meanwhile, Americans who had been told for the last three years that “affordable” (yet mandatory) health insurance had dawned were shocked to discover painfully expensive rates on enrollment websites that didn’t even work properly. Abroad, America’s allies in the Global War on Terror found out that they were being “data mined” (translation: spied on) by the “leader” of the “free” world.

Day after day for months now the American people have awakened to one existential crisis after another and been embarrassed before the world as revelation after revelation emerges of outrageous activity by Obama’s spy and drone forces. The United States of America’s polices, both at home and abroad, now resemble the chaos of the Byzantine Empire at its fall and the tyranny of the Soviet Union at its rise.

A few Democrats and Republicans have taken note of the spiraling dysfunction and suggested recently that America pursue a third party option. Washington D.C. is broken they say, so in their logic the only way to fix it is to throw out liberal Republicans and conservative Democrats, replacing both with a either a populist progressive or ultraconservative third party.

The sincerely intentioned yet ultimately deceived who think purely partisan solutions will fix America should Google “Weimar Republic” and discover this has all been tried before to no success in world history. Partisan remedies only mask the symptoms of a nation’s crisis but allow the real disease – excessive concentration of power among a few – to worsen.

Immediate relief from Washington’s abusive and unstable governance is best achieved in our local state capitols and city councils through the constitutional remedy of the Tenth Amendment. America’s founders engineered the Tenth Amendment into the Bill of Rights as a means to nullify and rebuke tyrannical abuses by the federal government against the states.

The founders studied history and, seeing the curse of Ozymandias on countless dead republics and democracies, recognized that only divided power could hold back the tide of tyranny. By reserving distinct and separate powers for the states and federal government, the founders believed that America could remain free from monolithic oppression.

The Tenth Amendment has never been repealed, though in practice it has of recent been ignored. It’s time for states to identify the unconstitutional federal laws, regulations and practices which have encumbered populations and depleted local budgets. State legislatures then need to act accordingly to nullify these illegal encroachments rather than waiting for Washington D.C. to change its collective mind on bad policy.

America’s state and city elected leadership need to remember well their oaths to uphold both the Constitution of the United States of America and their state charters. Look how bad things have turned for the nation in just the last three months alone. America cannot wait until 2014 or 2016 for vain hopes of rebooting the federal government.

America has already expressed its disgust and mistrust of Washington’s leadership. It’s time for the power of K Street to decline and for Main Street to arise, starting in our capitols and city councils. The rightful remedy is nullification and the right time to act is now.